0:00Helen spoke with James Beard every day for hours. So she was really munch into the New York intelligence here of cooking. And at some point she called me and she said, you know, I have that woman here. She has a book and she sent it to me and she's coming to come next week to New York and do you want to cook for her in my apartment? I said, "Sure."
0:27She said she's a very tall woman with a terrible voice. And of course, that was Julia Child.
0:36And we became friend. In fact, we spoke French more than English. Her French was better than my English at the time.
0:43Jacqu, thank you so much for welcoming me into your home. I've seen so many videos here and you've been my teacher from afar through books and videos for a very long time. So, thank you for that. Yeah, actually yes we do. We did in the other house but in this house starting with the pandemic up kings.
1:04Mhm. is not here today but started shooting here and uh I think we had uh two 300,000 people before the pandemic and we had like 2 million whenever we did like 10 12 show a day those show of like three four five minute just a little recipe to so yeah we've done a lot of show here yeah you've done a ton and part of the reason I wanted to have you on the show is because when I found you I was trying to
1:32learn how to cook and I had failed many times. And when I found you, I thought to myself, not only is this an incredible teacher of the culinary arts, but one of the best teachers of any skill I've ever seen, and I'm a bit of a collector of teachers, and so I wanted to ask you in the case of these videos or just broadly speaking, how do you think about preparation before the camera starts rolling, the setting the MIS Plus? Could you speak to that? Yes,
2:00preparation is very important but it should be unseen in a sense so to look natural and it can be I mean for me it's a question of making sure that I have the ingredient in the right place and that's it. I mean basically start cooking and following and I did that when I was doing show for PBS. I mean, you know, I did a lot of different series of 23 show one at the
2:28beginning of the show. I mean, usually the cameraman would come like four of them plus the producer and all that to say. So, I usually took them through the show and I say I'm going to start with B1 which is burner one. I put a thing in there and this and that and I go through the whole show like this with like three, four, five recipe. and they think I have the greatest memory of anyone they've never seen. I don't really have any memory. I go in my head, I say, I'm
2:57going to put that on the stove and it's going to take a minute or so. So, I can open the oven, I put that in, and during that time I can, you know, I work it out as I cook, following the recipe itself rather than the question of memory, you know. And the same idea there. I try to visualize in my head when I do a recipe what's coming next and what I need next and so forth. Yeah, I am fascinated by the overlay of
3:25skills, right? The transfer between different skills and arts and before I did homework for this conversation, I did not know how involved you were in painting.
3:35And I looked at a lot of your artwork.
3:38Fringe of the wood is one I really like. Flur one I also really loved. You have some incredible pieces and I'm wondering what similarities you've found between the culinary arts and the visual arts.
3:51There are but I mean cooking came way before painting you know panting came in this country after in France I never did and you know I was in apprentichip in 1949 so I mean it's many many years ago over 70 years but yet there are I mean often like in a recipe you know I think that you have to taste all the time so
4:19if I do a and be put together. I taste and adjust, then taste and adjust and keep building the recipe until it's okay. That's fine. That's it. And to a painting, a little bit of the same thing. Sometime I start with a color or two, especially if I work in something more abstract and kind of react to the color of the painting itself and I add something and I add another thing until I was satisfied with it. Is it good or
4:47not? I don't know. But if I'm satisfied, I'll stop there, you know.
4:52See, I'm certainly probably better at cooking than at panning. But, uh, I've been at it longer, I guess. So, one one part of your bio, and we're not going to go through every step because of course we would be here for probably 7 hours if we did that. But, one segue that I'd love for you to speak to is your very beginning chapters of learning how to cook. How did you go from that to cooking for the French heads of state?
5:20Well, it's a question of luck and at that time certainly the the cook was at the bottom of the social scale quite different than here. You know, I was a cook for several head of states. I mean, three of them and I had never been on that view with a magazine or a newspaper or whatever that did not exist. So now we are genius. who are famous but not at that time. Mh. So
5:49anyway, I worked in Paris in some of the maxim I mean the great place in Paris and then I was drafted in the Navy and that was during the Algerian war actually and I was supposed to go to Algeria and then they didn't send me they sent me back to Paris and the reason was that my brother was already in Algeria and they didn't send two brother at the same time so I end up at the head of the Navy thing in Paris and start cooking. for
6:18the the officer there. I had a friend of mine who was working for the secretary of treasurer and uh who came and he say could you come and give me a hand I have some dinner to do and I've never worked in Paris in big place so I don't really know so I say sure so I start doing that at that time the government were changing at a fairly rapid pace in France under the fourth republic and I end up being there with one of the the
6:47the head of treasurer and the government challenge and he became the prime minister of France. At that time the prime minister was the highest post that you could have in France because the president of the republic didn't really have much power.
7:02I end up standing there under three different president. The one that I started with Phelis Ga lasted 6 months and six and a half month and then I came eventually to the goal and I stay with him and uh you know doing state dinner I survived on the way near Tito McMillan I mean big head of state but as I said never once did I did I get on with a thing it didn't really exist otherwise I
7:32work with the head of the house in that case but the goal to do the dinner for the week and for the family and so forth. When it come to state dinner, then we had people from the outside coming to advise me what to do, not too long or this or that and so forth. You know, how did the cooking in that capacity cooking for the heads of state most differ from cooking in the restaurants prior to that?
7:58Well, this is more focused here. You're going to be focused to one person at the type of thing that they want to eat. So in a sense it's easier or more complicated depending on the way you you look at it. But for me I felt relatively comfortable in that position. You know we did dinner usually four 6 8 10 I think 25 was about the maximum of what I did. Then we had another organization
8:26who came if we had big big things of over 100 or 200 people.
8:32I want to flash back a little bit to growing up in wartorrn France. You previously said that your mother could cook with almost nothing and that that informed your, and I think these are your words, not mine, miserly cooking style. Could you give some examples of what you saw your mother do?
8:50My mother would never throw anything out in the refrigerator. And uh it became a bit of my motto, too. And uh what my wife called fridge soup is probably one of the best example. I open the refrigerator and uh I have wilted salad and onion been there for weeks and all. We take all of that together with water, salt, put it in a pot to make a soup.
9:16She used to call fridge soup that we did and finish with some pasta in it or rice or nothing at all. So, uh, this was a normal thing to do and certainly my mother was a little restaurant would work this way. Also, the fact that she didn't have she had a refrigerator, but I mean with a block of ice at that time and so she bought meat and she had to use it within a couple of days and so forth. So uh yes things were used and my
9:46aunt and my cousin it's all woman in my family in France was the little restaurant or cooking this way and even when I was with the president in France they were not particularly impressed by me. I remember going to Nua, which is a town not too far between Leon and Geneva, where my aunt had a little restaurant. Going to the kitchen to give her a hand, she throw me out, say, "You
10:14too much butter. Get out of here." You know, so I wanted to talk about some of maybe from the perspective of a lot of people who might read your bio, some unorthodox decisions that you made. One is being offered a job at the White House to cook for John F. Kennedy and instead taking a job at Howard Johnson.
10:36Could you walk us through how you made that decision?
10:40Well, to start with, when I was in Paris, I worked in Paris for quite a number of years. And I loved America at the time, jazz and so forth. I wasn't married, but I said, I think I'm going to go to America for a year, you know, America, New York. And that's I came on a student boat. I find a spot on a student boat and I remember there meeting one of the teacher who spoke French to and I asked him I say you know
11:09I'm going to be in New York I need to speak English better what do you think he said well there is a school in New York called Colombia University say they say you should go there it's a good school you know to learn English I said okay I came here sponsored by a small restaurant called tok bl the owner came to Paris at that point I met him and he said yeah if you want to come at that time for some reason the French were
11:39pretty easy to come I got a a passport and whatever I needed in like a few weeks and I came and I thought as I said that I would stay there for a year or two so that man that restaurant there he didn't have a job but he said oh I have a friend of mine it's the best restaurant in in New York and uh they need people you know like you so I'll take you there to introduce you to the chef it was peer friend and pier told me
12:08you want to start tomorrow so I say okay so I started working at the pavon and soon was the other pretty strong man you know and at some point after a few months there was some disagreement with the employee and with the union and with sle and he was going to clothes and so forth. At the same time, one of the clients of the pav was Howard Johnson, Howard D. Johnson, the father, the one
12:37who created the company. So, he approached Pier, he said, could you come and work for me? And Pier said, "Well, I don't know. I've never done that, but maybe." When I heard this, I said, "Can I go to with you?" So I end up going with spe to Howard Johnson which was a totally different type of job and we had klanch with Mr. Johnson to do to a certain extent what we wanted. So I remember you know in the test kitchen
13:06starting with three chicken poaching chicken taking them out to do a chicken cream sauce whatever and finishing with 3,000 lb of chicken in thousandgallon kettle you know doing it. So adjusting and doing like that with us that was pretty a fascinating thing. I had never done recipe before and to so I started doing uh it was a totally different world for me of production and I end up
13:34saying 10 years at Howard Johnson and learned a great deal in the writing of recipe and American eating habits and all of that that type of stuff. When I left Howard Johnson, I opened a restaurant on Fifth Avenue called Laotagerie which did soup in the mass production and then I opened the world center with Joe Bum as the executive chef you know with ser of 40,000 people a day you know in different restaurant
14:03then I was a consultant at the Russian Troom and I'm saying all of that to say I would never have been able to do those type of job without the training of Howard Johnson. M so Howard Johnson in a sense you know was an addition to what I knew and changed my life. Yes.
14:19It seems to me I don't know if this is fair to say but that you've you've made some decisions looking at your bio to maximize for learning right learning opportunity. And you seem to be inherently very curious. And it strikes me that gives me insight into how to teach. And I'm curious when you're writing books, I mean, you've you've published so many books and you've published classics that have
14:47become these iconic seminal works, how do you think about the right way to teach, say, culinary skills? Because a lot of cookbooks fail, right? People aren't able to use them. They don't acquire the skills. They don't acquire the technique. How do you think your approach to teaching differs? Maybe because of the training that I had in France in the breaking down of Angraian, it become very important to have the
15:16proper technique to do. And those technique are kind of universal. Whether you do French cooking or Italian or Spanish or whatever, an egg in an egg, your portion eggs or peel a tomato or bone out a chicken, you know, that could be applied to any of those. And I realized at some point that those technique and the way of breaking down things that fit with my character on what I
15:45wanted to do and this is the way I could teach people, you know, that they would remember instead of remembering a whole recipe, you know, remembering how to do that particular things, how to remember how to poach an egg the right way and so forth. So yeah, I started to emphasize more of the technique than the recipe.
16:07But it was lucky just happened at that time that people asked me do you want to do this? At some point I started giving classes at some point in my life. I had very bad accident. I had 12 fracture. The car accident broke my back, my hip, leg too and even that arm was totally destroyed.
16:28So that my wife signed at the the hospital removal of the left arm it was all broken and then they somehow saved it and most of the show that I did after but after that people don't realize I can't really ban it much more than that or so when I started it was coincidental at that time where cookware shop were opening in New York with little cooking school of in the back and they asked me
16:56starting with like at blooming there you want to come and give a class there. I said sure. So I came did a demonstration too and then I started going through the country doing this and I was amazed when I did the peel a carrot and said wow that's how you peel a carrot. I said yes carrot well so I couldn't believe so I say go back to concentrate on the proper way of doing it on the technique to more
17:25and more and that basically where I started doing book and one book after another book and so forth. So I want to really give you credit here because I study a lot of things. I work with a lot of coaches. I read books about skills I never intend to learn just to see how they are taught. And as someone who studied a lot of languages, let's just say like Chinese and Japanese, there are thousands of characters and you can make millions of different words
17:52and so on. But fundamentally, there are for instance in Japanese, I think it's around 114 fundamental building blocks of all these characters, right? So if you learn those fundamentals, then you can assemble them in many different ways. And what it strikes me you're so good at is distilling things down to these fundamental techniques and then teaching them in a very logical sequence so that people build confidence as they
18:21progress. And I'm curious after your accident, was that transition to teaching from being sort of a practitioner in the field to more so a teaching capacity? Was that difficult for you or did it just come naturally and you found that you actually enjoyed the teaching in some ways more than you did being in the back of house? You know, I think that it was pretty natural and uh I thought that I didn't really broke it down this way at the beginning,
18:50but instead of teaching cooking, teaching how to cook the basic recipe. And if you learn how to poor an egg, you learn how to push an eggs. Now, you can do it Chinese style or Italian or Russ, it doesn't really matter at that point. So I was not trying in fact to stay French or teach only French cooking. I was trying to teach people how to cook. That is to make your life easier faster.
19:17I mean when you're in a restaurant as you know you know it's 11:00 in the morning at 12:00 you have 100 people sitting down where you have three case of artworks to do. It's not a question of doing it. It's a question of doing it in like 45 minute too. So the speed and all that to become very important you know in the process of cooking and this is what I wanted to teach. So I started with as I said trying to break down the different technique and show
19:47them how to do regardless of whether those technique were more French or Italian or or whatever.
19:54I want to talk about a few I hesitate to call them ingredients. They seem more important. Maybe they're worthy of a different label, but I was looking back at the 9090 campaign. So 90 years, 90 dinners, this nationwide dinner series that you did, celebrating your 90th birthday, raising money for culinary education. And I'm looking at some of the stats here. So 37 dinners featured chicken, 40 featured egg dishes, and then 30 birthday cakes, and there are many other statistics. Do chicken and
20:22eggs have a special place in your heart and in your teaching? the number of people who have sent me videos when I told them that I was going to be interviewing you related to making omelets, right? Or looking at your artwork and seeing that you have a piece that's entirely chicken faces basically, right? Chicken heads.
20:41And I'm just wondering if these are particularly meaningful to you or they're useful as a core of of cooking in some way. I'm just curious if you have any special relationship to these ingredients, eggs and cheese. Well, it seems that I do, you know, but I was born in France in a town called Burham breast and the chicken of breast are pretty well known. White plumage, blue feet and all that, they are considered some of the greatest chicken that you
21:09have in restaurants. So, the police breast. So uh yes in apprentichip and before I was always involved with chicken and not only killing chicken plucking chicken and all that when I was an apprentice and by extension the eggs of course and the eggs for me is always one of the greatest things and egg there's so many variation that you can do with eggs and so forth. So, yes, I often go back to
21:36chicken or eggs, whether uh I realize it or not, frankly. Well, I'll show you the video afterwards. My friend Jeffrey, I mentioned him before we started recording, sent me a video for you of his daughter and his son both using your techniques. He went to the French Culinary Institute and uh has a lot of thanks to send your way.
21:59Could you share a bit about your foundation? How did the foundation begin? What is its purpose?
22:06Well, I'm very lucky this way because I do a lot of cooking. I did hundreds of show and all that. But to put things together, I'm not that great and my daughter Clin is better than I am for this. And she married a chef. So, he was very good at that. And he's been teaching at Johnson as well for like 15 years. And so he kind of took over and
22:35created the Jacqu Peppa Foundation. At some point he said, you know, you've done so many hundred and hundreds of video and show who would you like to teach? And you know, I thought about it.
22:47I said, people who have been a bit maybe disenfranchised with life, you know, people who come out of jail or drug addict, former drug addict, people like this. Yes, that would be nice. And because I feel that in five six weeks if I work with someone I can show someone how to wash salad and you know poor and eggs and do something and all the basic
23:14that you do in a kitchen you know and that person if they stay in that kitchen within maybe a year and a half two years they may be the chef they become and they have kind of redo their life too and as we said in the kitchen there is So political application in the kitchen, you know, and so we all go to do the same thing, you know, to make people happy. And I started doing more of this, I mean, because of my son-in-law. And he
23:44he organized the drug paper foundation and does a great job with that. And I've been happy to work with him. I would never have been able to do that by myself.
23:53And we'll link to that in the show notes for people as well at tim.blogpodcast.
23:58I'll add that at the end of our chat as well. I wanted to come back. You mentioned since you mentioned your daughter, I think I'm getting this date right, but 1967. So, you publish the other half of the egg with Helen McCully and your daughter is born in the same year. How did becoming a father and a parent change you? Well, you know, you always cook for someone and my wife was
24:25very good at that and yeah, we went to restaurants occasionally, but cooking at home was something which was very important. So, it remind me that when I was a kid, you know, coming out of school, you get into the kitchen. This is the place which is comfortable, the place where the smell, the look of the kitchen, the whole feeling of it was part of my life. And I wanted it to be more or less the same for clothing,
24:52which I think it did. And she end up she didn't want to have anything to do with cooking. And then she married a chef, of course. So, so funny how that works. Yeah.
25:03This is what happened, you know, in family. So, yeah, she's a pretty good cook herself, you know, without any question. So, yeah, it was fine. And I mean it's as I said in the kitchen we have we always have a good time in the kitchen with the saying everyone look the same in the eye of the stove. So and it's true you know in the kitchen there is no political application you don't when you had a good time.
25:29Mhm. What were the first dishes that Claudine cooked as a child? Were there any early dishes or techniques that that you remember teaching?
25:37I can think of it. Yes. I knew that you know my brain after 90 it's kind of going I forget thing that I knew all my life too. I think that clothing worked I think she worked with with chicken or with eggs also like yeah when she worked I remember when she was at BU Boston University I end up teaching there.
26:02Yeah. So she has a little apartment. I went there to cook in her in her little apartment. And then a couple of time she invited me. One time she invited me and chicken that she bought. She bought the most expensive chicken that she could find to roast for me which end up being an old male chicken whatever. Tough like hell. So chewy maybe.
26:29Yes. She is good at cooking in the kitchen and make her happy. So I never thought when she was in school at BEu and then she went to France to that she was going to marry the chef, but she did. Destiny unavoidable. How did you connect with the trinity of American cooking when you got here? That is to say these sort of seinal figures, beard and child and so
26:57on. How did how did that come together?
26:59Well, it started again at the Pavon.
27:03When I was at the Pavon, the time that I stay there, Craig Le who started at the New York Time to review the Pavon did a glowing review of the Pavio actually and we closed not that long after, but I live on 50th and 1st Avenue and Craig live on 53rd. So we become friend and he's the one who introduced me to someone who live on 52nd Street First
27:30Avenue which was Helen McCaule was the food editor of MCL house beautiful and so forth and she was already a lady in her 60s and she kind of took me under her wing in a sense and became kind of a my surrogate mother said don't wear this don't wear that do this do that and Helen spoke with James Beard every day for hours. So she was really munched
27:58into the New York intelligencia of cooking. And at some point she called me and she said, "You know, I have that woman here. She has a book and she sent it to me and she's coming to come next week to New York and do you want to cook for her in my apartment?" I said, "Sure." She said, "She's a very tall woman with a terrible voice." And of course that was Julia Child.
28:23So I met Julia there and we became friend. In fact we spoke French more than English. Her French was better than my English at the time. So I stay friend with Julia for years and with James Pier as well but in a different way. The food world to go back to your question was very small at that time. I didn't even know when except for Pier Friday and a couple of thing. I didn't know one French chef usually the chef that I knew different
28:53hotel were Swiss, German, Italian sometime to that many French you know so nothing changed.
29:01It's also wild to think about the chance encounters in life and the incredible luck of living where you lived so close to all of these people.
29:14Yes. It's just remarkable how sometimes the cards fall in the right way. How did New York change you as a person being there at that time? I think it changed me being in New York completely. I didn't really realize it, but I love America. I love school. And I end up going to Colombia 1959. I took the subway the week after I was there and find someone who spoke French eventually
29:43to be able to enroll in English for foreign students, you know. And so I started with this and went on to school.
29:53Remember I left school in France at 13 to go into apprentichip. After the certificate they stood which is where you have to go in France which usually you finish at 14. I I had finished at 13, but I went back to school at Colombia from 1959 to 1972 where I proposed a doctoral dissertation on an history of food context civilization literature you know and at
30:22that time department there they say food you cannot talk about food for a doctoralation so food was really at the bottom again of the subject that you would have taken and eventually They gave me a PhD years later and I start teaching at BEu, you know, and Cloudine went there and I asked Julia at some point to join me. So we talked to the president of BEu to
30:50create a master of liberal arts with a concentration in gastronomy which was kind of unique. So he accepted it and then we started teaching and Julia was teaching there too.
31:03How do you think of uh I cook the others?
31:08She doesn't just burn.
31:10Did you hear tough chicken? I've been sitting here right there.
31:13Oh, you Oh, you have. Okay.
31:18Nice to meet you, too.
31:20So, Clud is going to come and correct me then.
31:24Do you want to come sit over here, Clinty?
31:28What is the first dishes that you did? I didn't bring Well, you traumatized me. I tried to make Toll House cookies with the bag and you changed the recipe. Oh, you made me do something else and it didn't taste like tall house cookies. That I buried my head.
31:46Wow. This made an imprint.
31:48Yeah. You always say you have to do the recipe exactly as written at least twice.
31:54You didn't follow your own advice.
31:57What What are you allowed to do after you do it twice? You allowed to improvise after that? Yeah, probably not with baking though. Honestly, baking's Yeah, I remember somebody said to me once they said I was like, "How do you decide on sweet or savory if you're have to choose one of those paths?" And they were like, "Well, do you like to fold your socks in your sock drawer?" And I was like, "What do you mean?" They're like, "If so, you might want to do baking."
32:20I didn't think you started with something sweet.
32:24Well, no. I think that before that, um, I did the spinach and the bashameal sauce. Oh yes, one time I messed that up.
32:33Yeah, I remember that up. I actually changed. She changed my recipe.
32:38What was What was the recipe?
32:41I mean the recipe at the time again just like I was criticizing not criticizing but discussing with Julia who would do stuff in the older style because Julia always say we started cooking together to an extent. True. 1949 I was in apprentice ship. 1949 she came to France start cooking.
33:05So then often when we cook together she was still cooking in the old style. One time we were doing spinach. So I had a skillet took a handful of wet spinach. Well put it in the skillet to cover it. She said no no no we got to blunch it.
33:20Yes. In France we have a big things of water cooking and you put the green vegetable in there. Bring them to a boil. Boil them few minutes. Drain it.
33:28Cool it off, press it into bowl and you have spinach ready to be saute or do whatever you old style. I said we don't do that anymore. But actually the first time I did it was with her in a s she did Yeah. I said, "Well, we're going to do spinach cream sauce." So I did a bashamela, you know, a bit of a a r and some milk and cream. Bring it to a boil.
33:53I said, "Okay, we're going to cook the spinach." She took spinach, she threw them directly into the bish. I said, "No, we got to branch it." So, why? I said because we branched them. I said, "Okay, fine. We don't blanch them." So, we throw them in there. So, there. That was the first time we actually got it.
34:09How did it turn out?
34:11It was good. Look at that. All right.
34:14But, but you said something I want to come back to, which is you have to do the recipe exactly as it's described twice.
34:22Yeah. A couple of times. Yes. Too. And then what are you allowed to do after that?
34:26Well, after that you have the taste in your mouth. So you want to reach that taste. If you can reach it in a better way, faster way, okay, that's okay. You know, that's fine. But I know people I've seen people cooking with a recipe that they never follow at all. And I don't agree with that. At least once or twice, do it according to whoever did the recipe did. so that you have the the reference of that of that taste and then you can try to get there in a more
34:55I guess elegant way.
34:57All right. Well, I like this. I like what's going on here.
35:00Sorry. I realized we're going to make this hell for whoever's going to edit this up.
35:04A little bit of honey.
35:05Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, but the other thing is you might you might decide you like it with more cream or more, you know, with your taste and then you can adjust it. Right. Jacqu no cream.
35:17Or no cream. Yeah. Yeah.
35:18The only thing that my mother would tell my father when he walked in the kitchen was, "Don't touch anything."
35:24Oh, yeah. Yeah. My wife, I want to hear. All right. I want to hear more about this. This is this is I feel like this is gold here.
35:33So, so just said the the one thing that her mother, your wife, would say to you when you walked in the kitchen, don't touch anything. Why? Why?
35:43Here come that great chef. You know that I'm there and I come into the kitchen. My wife is cooking. People would think that they would say, "What do you think?" or whatever. No, she would say, "Don't touch anything."
35:55That's the first thing that she would say.
35:58Amazing. Any other greatest hits, golden stories? We I There's so much. I don't really know. It was interesting growing up in a house full of cooks, that's for sure.
36:09Yeah. I mean, what do you think differentiates your dad from other educators, teachers of these skills, of the philosophies and the principles behind the skills? What comes to mind for you?
36:25Truthfully, I think that it's his equity. I always call my father from he's like from carrots to caviar. Mhm.
36:36So if he's cooking for people who may never afford or have never tasted truffles, he never talks down to anyone. Just because you can't afford something doesn't mean you shouldn't learn about it or want to learn about.
36:52So that type of meritocratic approach to teaching, right? As opposed to looking down, looking up, looking sideways or whatever, you know, the perspective might be. Think about the quintessential French chef that you see in movies that is like well you know but he's never been that way and the only time you go is if you don't do the way he wanted you to do it um then you might get in trouble but um
37:19but everyone should be exposed and he's always so excited to find something new.
37:26I mean it's never like okay we're friends we're better than you all. He went to is it when you went to China?
37:34And they put besame on the pizza or something.
37:37We talk about crazy thing that there was a buffet.
37:44And some people were putting the bashimal on the pizza because they didn't know not to.
37:49Yeah. Because we did No, I did a glass too for the filling up plate. They keep adding to us. Yeah. Yeah. the end up on the roast chicken. But uh yes, people do that. But uh I've never seen anybody more excited to find something he's never tasted.
38:10Still now I still still the most excited person in the room to find something you haven't tasted.
38:16Well, yes. It's already exciting to and even to cook with people and who have a different point of view that you have, you know. So it's interesting sometime to go with someone and have a piece of chicken or whatever it is and say it's perfectly the way I want it. And for me it is already too cooked or to this or to that and you know it's a question of taste also. You can relate to certain type of taste
38:46which for you are just right but from other people. Yeah, I've read you quoted as saying that the food of one's childhood stays with them and becomes more than food.
38:59What are some foods from your childhood that you really remember?
39:03Well, the taste, you know, of certainly of certain type of soup that my mother did, potato certainly because just out of the garden, she would have the tiny potato and saute them directly. So certain taste like this stay with you forever, you know, and with ordinary ingredient most of the time. And even a salad, a salad season the right way, which is not that easy. And people wash
39:32the salad sometime they don't drain it properly. They still too much water in it. They do the mixture of oil and vinegar and mustard, too much of one thing or too much of the other one. or they mix it too early and then it gets wilted or the salad is too cold and sometime you know it's a lot of little thing like this to say that salad is perfect you know just mix just right
40:01and mix at the right moment the temperature is good there is no water still in there too doesn't happen all the time you know so yeah I don't know I feel like I want to like indulge in this whole situation that's going on here So, we're going to like do a little dance here. What are the adjectives that you think best describe your father? I mean, like resilient comes to mind for me. Curious comes to mind for me. What else comes to mind for you?
40:30Teacher, definitely.
40:33Impatient. Okay. I kind of takes one to no one in my case. I I'm very I'm also My mom would say from out of the box, very impatient. What type of there are different flavors of impatience. How would you describe um I I don't think that there's one sort of thing.
40:56Just when he's run out of patience like or if you're going on too long to explain something, he's like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah.
41:05I'm the same way. So, I'm very very similar. I'm not saying I'm not saying that to you know excuse it in all circumstances but I I sympathize. You know sometimes I wonder if the impatience goes along with the learning right like if you have a hunger for that and you want to get to like some type of reward at the end of the rainbow. I I mean I have this voracious appetite also for for learning
41:34but there is a certain like facet of it that I think is close to impatience also. I don't know just just thinking out loud.
41:41I mean it's partly being a chef too. I mean just intrinsic to being a chef is being impatient on some level.
41:49Yeah. Because every do it now.
41:52There's no there do it now.
41:56Clean it. Clean it now.
41:58Do it now. I'd like to see that book. It doesn't mean I'd like to see that book in five minutes. It means get up and get the book.
42:07My husband I am the same way because close to my mom and my dad were like that. It do it now was just always an understood.
42:17And I can look at my husband.
42:19The assumed is do it now.
42:20More patience in five minutes.
42:22Yeah. And I can say, "Hey, can you get some wine from the seller?" I don't and I'll just sit there and just see.
42:33When I was uh even around 10 years old, I'd be in a restaurant. I drink a lot of water and if my water glass sat empty for more than like 2 or 3 minutes, I would just get up as a kid and just walk into the kitchen. This is as a customer, right? Like just get up, walk in, and go find the water, come out and pour my own water.
42:52Who are some who are some chefs that stand out to you as very skilled technicians or chefs broadly speaking? Are there any names that come to mind who you respect for different reasons? I mean certainly people like Thomas Keller and Pier Fren that I work with but yes usually chef who are able to organize a kitchen and make it works flawlessly you know
43:20without it's like a ballet and very often you camera will come into the kitchen and if it's really a good kitchen like Thomas Ker they'll probably say no more than 5 m says nothing is going on here let's go because it's like a ballet it works They like to see people yelling wearing which is not really what happened in the kitchen which is well well run you know but many chef that we have in this
43:47country now I mean you know name Jose yes is different because he has his own style and his own thing and it's yeah he sticks out in a different way than uh you worked for Elite Yeah. Yeah. I know. I know. Yeah.
44:11Well, yeah. Daniel is I can How does say Danielle differ from Thomas Thomas Keller? Like how are they different?
44:20To look at it in a different way.
44:23Danielle will be I guess more French in the sense that the choice of his gradient and for me is from Leon particularly to so I can feel more of similarity with him that I would feel with Thomas you know even though Thomas I remember Thomas when he works upset New York in a restaurant called Lariv his brother came there to put him there when he was like 14 or 15 years old make
44:51him work there in that kitchen for a small French restaurant along the river upset New York in the Catskill. So I know him a long time and uh he's a great chef. Yeah, there's no question about it. I'll reiterate something that you said. I remember the first and only time I've been to per se Thomas and I and I did a tour of the kitchen which I like to do if I'm allowed to and it was as you said dead silent. It's like a library.
45:21Yeah. and a number of tiled mottos on the walls related to excellence and precision. And it was it was like being in a library plus surgery at the same time. I mean, everything was very precise. It was very quiet, like you said, a quiet ballet. Food was of course impeccable.
45:44What does it take to run a kitchen like that?
45:48Well, it takes a lot and necessarily it is in a sense opposite to little pistro that you would go in France or in Italy and so forth whether with one person cooking you go to the market and get your food and start cutting your food and doing it just like with one person too. So it's totally different than the organization of a brigad where you have 20 people working each one assigned to a
46:16very specific task you know in the kitchen which is what I learned at the plaza and in Paris but the opposite of what my mother and all that would do in a little restaurant to so it's different way of looking at the food very often at the plaza and in Paris we were 48 cook you know in the kitchen we did the lobster sule for example special I'm sure that 48 of us could have done it you would never have done which one has
46:44done it you know and is it good is it bad no yeah it's a way at that time this is the way it was taught you know and I think that to a certain extent this is the way you should teach so people have a a body of knowledge that they have and if someone has talent you take that body of knowledge and you transcend it and you put your role I'm premature on it and do your own stuff. So, it's slightly different at that point.
47:12If you're thinking about for somebody who's not familiar, right, as you're mentioning these different stations, right, and hopefully this won't I love the movie Ratatouille. I think it's a fun film. It's a Pixar film, but they at some point they go around and they name the different stations, right?
47:26So, I'm using that reference for people who are coming from outside the culinary world. Is it structured on some type of military organization?
47:36Is Thomas Keller more like a general or a CEO or something else? Or is is cooking really its own world? I'm just thinking about the organization and the flow and the process and all of these different responsibilities.
47:48A disposition where he is now. Yes. Mhm.
47:51would be like a general, like a CEO and so forth. As opposed to if even himself, if you take him to the country and you tell him to serve dinner out of his house or out of a little thing by himself, all of a sudden it's going to be different.
48:09But in a professional kitchen, you know, each one is allowed. I mean at the plaza and in Paris we had like eight different type of soup just the soup the different consume and all that was you know so the structure was very important to follow the rule which on the other hand if you cook at home and you have a little restaurant you do your menu of the day and you work on that on those days without worrying too much about the way
48:38it's done in term of quantity and so forth.
48:42Do you have any and feel free to chime in also, right?
48:45I mean, somebody like Chef Keller is a teacher too and that they have a role and they have a duty to teach and that's part of it when you get to that level. It should be Yeah. And a mentor.
48:56And a mentor. Yeah. Especially for Thomas is always really supportive and happy when somebody he has taught and mentors goes and does something else as opposed to feeling resentful or you slighted.
49:12Yeah. Just to echo since I'm closer to the mic. So Claudine was saying how in the case of Thomas Keller and Danielle and you know I know Danny Meyer also very similar like super and Tom Kio and yeah many examples like Thomas Keller just as a side note since we're just having jam session here.
49:32One of my favorite ways to cook roasted chicken came from not any dish prepared in his restaurant. Well it was prepared but it was for staff meals.
49:41Before service, just a super simple high temperature way of cooking roast chicken. I was like, man, that's so simple. So few moving pieces. I just struck me as so elegant.
49:53Did he do it breast side down and then I think he did breast side down and it was much higher temperature than I would have expected. I'd have to go back and look at the exact temp, but I was like, "Oh, interesting." And I was like, "Man, I would think it would get very dry, but no." I worked for someone that had been kind of a protege of Thomas and I after I worked for him he always said if anybody wants to open their own bakery here's all the recipes.
50:21He will give you his incredible and that's the spirit and that comes from Jacques.
50:26Yeah. Okay. Got it. So just again I'm I'm relaying different different messages and stories from around the room but you were saying one more time. Who was it? This is somebody you worked with.
50:37Yeah. But the point is Jacques always says that chefs are generous and chefs are generous.
50:41And the highest for it does my personal story doesn't matter. The highest form of the chef in Jacques's model would be a teacher and and generous. And they're not going to say you can't have my recipe.
50:54The point is that when you have a recipe that you give to people, you give the same recipe to five different people, you have five different dish, you know. So it's not like it's exactly the same. You give that recipe and everything come exactly the same. No, it never come the same. Exactly.
51:10Everybody's got their finger unique fingerprints.
51:13The the recipe is just a way of going but it's the whole thing you know the rest of it is what you you do with it.
51:22Do you have any motive your life by? I'm curious if there are any you see what I'm kind of grasping for here, right? You'll never be as good as you are today.
51:34Well, Jacques always says we are all equal in the eyes of the stove. Is our motto of the foundation.
51:40We're all equal in the eyes of the stove, which isn't amazing. And then wait, what was the other?
51:45I didn't know that one, Claudia.
51:47Yeah, that's what that's that's the kiss of death out of a restaurant.
51:52Never be as good as you were today.
51:53What does that mean? You'll never be as good as you are today. This is this is like during service.
51:58As good as you are today.
51:59Yeah. Oh, but what what does that mean?
52:03How did you enjoy your dinner?
52:05Oh, you'll never be as good as you were today.
52:08Oh, you'll never be as good as you were today. Meaning like you're never going to top this.
52:12Yeah, but does it mean it was good?
52:18It's like a very confucious, you know, type response. Okay, got it. Yeah, that's a tough one. That's I could see that somebody really having insomnia after getting told that. Well, if that's what he says, then chances are Yeah.
52:34Well, I do want to mention a few things just for people to follow up with. The foundation is jpfoundation.
52:41That's true, right? And we'll link to all the social and YouTube and and so on.
52:47And there are hundreds and hundreds of hours of free recipes on the website.
52:55On the foundation website.
52:57Okay. So, hundreds and hundreds of hours of free recipes.
53:02Yeah. The chef are generous. We have 300 chef, right?
53:05Yes. That's the recipe book. That's a little different.
53:08Yeah. But I mean, they gave their time and they gave Yes. But that's still a different piece. But um but of my father's recipes, whether it's on YouTube, which is free, or um through the foundation techniques, you can look it up by book, by show, by chicken, for instance.
53:29Can you say that one more time? This is on the foundation website. foundation website, there's just hundreds of hours of free teaching because if what we're trying to do is to help people in their kitchens or get a job, the idea of charging for that information doesn't antithetical. Yeah. To what you're trying to do.
53:48I mean, we we are a foundation. We do want financial support, of course, but we also want to provide hundreds of hours of freeh free learning. Yeah.
53:59Yeah. I have to say that when I think of it, I am more interested in teaching the home cook than the professional because so I show you how to make a recipe too which in a professional kitchen it's never the same exactly depending I work at a Russian tea room.
54:16I mean the amount of I had three guy behind the stove we end up serving a thousand people sometimes. So so the quantity and all that all that quite different you know. Yeah. It's never the same.
54:30Is there anything else that I mean, we've we've covered a good amount of ground. I mean, I'm wondering if there's anything else that would be fun to cover or that you guys would like to cover.
54:38I think waste in the kitchen is an interesting.
54:41My father will tell a story of working at the Russian tea one and they were doing asparagus something and the guy just like cut the asparagus and threw the bottom away.
54:55Oh, okay. Well, let's let's what's the right question to ask then?
54:59What do you find different between working in a professional restaurant and working in your own home as far as waste is concerned?
55:08Yeah. Okay. Let me ask.
55:09No, the question is not there. I said I I'll get to the Russian t room and the bunch of asparagus are there, the broccoli are there and they come in the way. The guy cut the top of it and throw the rest in the garbage. Is it right or is is it wrong?
55:27It's both right and wrong. I had three guy behind the stove. There is no way they could peel it and all that. So we do it because this is the way it is there. It is wrong by definition. You don't throw out food like this. But uh in place like this with the amount of production that you do, yes, you you have all of your vegetable, you cut the head of of the broccoli, you cut the head of the asparagus, the rest goes into the garbage because there's no way
55:54anyone has any time to do it and do anything with it, you know, and it's wrong. No question.
56:01Some staggering percentage of food production in the US is wasted, right?
56:05It's like 30 40%. Yeah.
56:07Some And mostly wasted out of home refrigerators.
56:14But she won't do that at home.
56:18She'll only do it here.
56:19She won't throw anything when you're not looking.
56:25Well, Jacqu, there going to be a lot of people watching this and listening to this who are inspired to get started perhaps watching your videos. tiptoeing into the kitchen to try cooking for the first time. What would you say to them?
56:40What would you say to those people who are not yet home cooks but are hoping to learn? Maybe they are looking to create more opportunities for themselves. Maybe they just want to make a meal for their family but they don't have the confidence yet. What would you say to them?
56:53Have a glass of wine.
56:55A glass of wine. Good start.
56:58Yeah. And don't make it for what it's not I mean it's good. you know that you're going to do something and it will come out good, very good, extremely good. Okay, but one way or the other is going to be eatable. So just go with it and try to analyze it yourself. Say that was good, but I shouldn't have done that before. I should, you know, try to analyze your food, try to correct it, and next time
57:28you do better, you know. So that's how you learn, I think. Yeah. Yeah, trial and error. Have a glass of wine. Well, I think that's I mean as good a place as any to start to land the plane.
57:42Certainly people should check out jp.foundation. I'll put that in the show notes at tim.blog/mpodcast as well. Did we miss anything that comes to mind?
57:50I you could talk to Jacques for ever and ever. But I think this was great. And yeah, I would like to mention that even though or or in addition to him turning 91 this year, he has two more books in the works.
58:11And I think that's pretty exciting.
58:13That's amazing. All right. So turning turning 91 this year and you have two more books in the works.
58:17Well, yeah. One of them I did a book with Julia Child 2000. So 20 years ago, 26 years ago. and they want to redo it with more of my drawing, painting and all that. So say great. So we are doing that and the second one did a book of menu. I don't know if you've seen any book of menu. No.
58:39Well, we should give you one then.
58:42And and all that. I have about 12 book here of menu going back more than 50 years. I know there is a menu. She's 5 years old and she draw the chicken and all that. So that's yes and when people come we did the we started doing the menu like this my wife wanted to do that and we asked the people to sign on the other page you know they waiting for dinner so so that's great memory I mean
59:10certainly I have my two brother who died my mother many many people my wife of course were important in my life are in those book of menus you know so so it's a good memory to do that at home. So we are publishing that book of menu after with about 100 menu or 120 menu. Yeah. Yeah. 150 menu.
59:38250. All right. We got there.
59:44And we can always do like outro audio and stuff that I record after the fact if you think of other things to include.
59:50You want to get one?
59:51Well, yes. I just I've I'm already No. Yeah. No, you're done. She's done already.
59:58This is We're just We're just having a party. I'm good.
1:00:01And the the yellow one that I'm using there.
1:00:07So, this I mean we like we haven't this the delivery date for this will be May, but we're going to do like Jacques Slay in his many years.
1:00:16Oh, these are cool.
1:00:18That's a more recent one. Jacques, it's it's not complicated to do, you know? I mean, people do that at home and and these are gorgeous.
1:00:27Yeah. I remember when people come the year after say, "What is what did I cook the last time they were here?"
1:00:33This is really fun. I um when I finish a bottle of wine at home, I have the friends who are with me signs.
1:00:41The cork. And we saved the corks.
1:00:43The book of men he had done previously. This was so you can fill out your own, but this one is more narrative. So, so people can fill up their own menu. So beautiful.
1:00:54So, we'll give you one of those.
1:00:58Well, Jacques, thank you so much for taking the time. Thank you for having me here.
1:01:02It's lovely to finally meet.
1:01:03Thank you for coming. I don't know whether I answer any question.
1:01:06Oh, you did. You did. You did. I think I'm going to take your advice on having that glass of wine at some point, but thank you again.
1:01:13Thank you. Thank you for coming.
1:01:15And for everybody listening and watching, everything in the show notes, Tim. podcast and as always be a bit kinder than is necessary. Until next time to others and to yourself. Thanks for tuning in with the
